Mayr bashing

[John Grehan]

>Mayr's contributions to evolutionary biology and to the history of biology
>need no defense.  They will remain standard works when Croizat is a mere
>footnote.
>
>Does that qualify as a flame, or just a smoldering ember?
>
>Bill Shear

This may well be true and I have no problem with it. Without a doubt Croizat's
view of evolution is at variance with a majority of practioners and the
situation
may well stay that way. Since Mayr's contributions express viewpoints in the
majority, they obviously need no defense and I would not presume otherwise.

Interestingly, Mayr said that the reason he never critiqued Croizat (at
least directly)
was that Croizat was so wrong about everything that it was not worth the effort,
and history would be the judge of that decision.
(I paraphrase here but that's more or less the jist of it).

John Grehan